This amendment is unskilfully drawn. Black is no color. It is simply the absence of color. Mulattoes are colored, because yellow is a color. Suffrage is not a right, but a privilege which can be extended, or modified, or withdrawn, as in the cases of criminals, by the sovereign State. In some of the States, suffrage in certain cases is allowed to be exercised by aliens who have simply declared their intention to become citizens of said States and of the United States, and also by females. A. W. Clason, in "The Fallacy of 1776," says: "War in 1861 was the logical outcome of the fallacy of 1776, and if there were any fallacies of opinion in 1861, they in their fullness of time will bear equally bitter fruit." The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments are fallacies which belong to the latter period in our history.

In a late special paper Murat Halstead argues that both amendments, from Grant to Harrison, have been nullified, and no President or Congress can stop it. He urges the repeal of the Fifteenth Amendment because it is only "a sentiment"!

ARTICLE FIFTEENTH.

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

The following is the certificate of the Secretary of the United States, announcing the ratification of the foregoing article:

HAMILTON FISH, Secretary of State of the United States:

To all to whom these presents may come, Greeting:

Know ye, that the Congress of the United States, on or about the twenty-seventh day of February, in the year one thousand eight hundred and sixty-nine, passed a resolution in the words and figures following, to wit:

"A resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

Resolved, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of both houses concurring) that the following article be proposed to the legislatures of the several States as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which, when ratified by three-fourths of said legislatures, shall be valid as part of the Constitution, namely:" (See Art. XV., above.)

And, further, that it appears from official documents on file in this department that the amend

ment to the Constitution of the United States, proposed as aforesaid, has been ratified by the legislatures of the States of Maine, North Carolina, West Virginia, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Louisiana, Michigan, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, New York, New Hampshire, Nevada, Vermont, Virginia, Alabama, Missouri, Mississippi, Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Nebraska, and Texas-in all, twenty-nine States;

And, further, that the States whose legislatures have so ratified the said proposed amendment constitute three-fourths of the whole number of States in the United States;

And, further, that it appears from an official document on file in this department that the legislature of the State of New York has since passed resolutions claiming to withdraw the said ratification of the said amendment, which had been made by the legislature of that State, and of which official notice had been filed in this department ;

And, further, that it appears from an official document on file in this department that the legislature of Georgia has by resolution ratified the said proposed amendment:

Now, therefore, be it known that I, Hamilton Fish, Secretary of State of the United States, by virtue and in pursuance of the second section of

the act of Congress, approved the twentieth day of April, in the year eighteen hundred and eighteen, entitled "An act to provide for the publication of the laws of the United States, and for other purposes," do hereby certify that the amendment aforesaid has become valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of the Constitution of the United States.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the Department of State to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington this thirtieth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and seventy, and of the independence of the United States the ninety-fourth. [L. S.] HAMILTON FISH.

The Congress of 1868-70 were the first to "count in" States. "Counting in" New Jersey, Ohio, and New York was disfranchisement of sovereign States. It was an act of numerical force; and a Cromwellian usurpation. This fractional body of factionists initiated the Electoral Commission of 1877.

Is the title "Secretary of State" proper?

It is not. The title and signature should be Secretary of the United States. The United

States are not a State. Each State has a Secretary of State, presiding over a Department of State. The United States established prior to 1789 a Department of Foreign Affairs. The chief was then known as Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Subsequently his office was renamed. He now outranks all other Cabinet members because his office is the oldest, and he is the first of them to succeed to the Presidency, by a late law, in case of the death, disability, resignation, or removal of both the President and Vice-President. Jefferson was the first "Secretary of State" under the new Constitution.

Will you describe the evolution of constitutional government?

The Stamp Act, which was an internal revenue tax on written instruments used in judicial and commercial proceedings, and upon articles which were necessary to the ordinary transactions of business, such as deeds, indentures, pamphlets, newspapers, advertisements, almanacs, and degrees conferred by schools, and other things, moved Patrick Henry to introduce into the Virginia Assembly a burning protest. This led to a call from Massachusetts for the assembling of a first Congress on the 7th October, 1765, which issued a declaration of rights and grievances.